Ramsey Calls on State to Restart Executions

In an opinion piece published in The Tennessean Tuesday, Lt. Gov. and Senate Speaker Ronald Ramsey says it “is time to have the moral courage to give taxpayers and victims the justice they demand and deserve” by getting “serious about the death penalty.” Ramsey argues the time is right to restart executions because the state has a workable and “as humane as possible” method for administering lethal injections, and that with advances in DNA technology we can be “more positive than ever that those convicted of capital crimes are guilty.” He notes that 79 people await execution on Tennessee’s death row and that on average, they spend 20 years waiting for their final punishment.